Author: Thereasa Winnett

Thereasa Winnett is the founder of Teach One Reach One and blogger at Parenting Like Hannah. She holds a BA in education from the College of William and Mary. She has served in all areas of ministry to children and teens for more than thirty years and regularly leads workshops for ministries and churches. She has conducted numerous workshops, including sessions at Points of Light’s National Conference on Volunteering and Service, the National Urban Ministry Conference, Pepperdine Bible Lectures, and Lipscomb’s Summer Celebration. Thereasa lives in Atlanta, GA with her husband Greg, where she enjoys reading, knitting, traveling and cooking.

Christian Service Project Survey – I Need Your Input

Christian Service Project Survey - Parenting Like Hannah — Photo by Odegaard Library

In the next few months, Lord willing, you will have a lot of new resources at your fingertips to help you dedicate your children to God. I don’t want to ruin the surprise by revealing too much now, but I think you will be excited to see everything we will have to help you on your journey. The best part? Everything will be free! We have seen this as a ministry to moms all over the world and now with the expansion we hope to help others who are reaching the children of the world for God.

Right now I desperately need your help! Part of this journey to expand the ministry has led to me leading a workshop at a major service conference in June. I am attempting to do a little informal research to augment the formal research I have found.

Can you please take about two minutes of your time and answer a few questions about the last service experience you had with a faith based organization? It could be Church, para-church, recovery program, children’s home – anything that welcomes God as a part of its mission.

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Kids, Weakness, and God

Ever watch a bunch of young boys try to “out tough” each other? It’s a wonder any boys make it to adulthood!. These sessions designed to prove one has no weaknesses, have probably resulted in the creation of more than one extreme sport and quite a few body parts in casts.

There is something in all of us, that wants to put on a brave front. Maybe it is because we fear showing our weaknesses will turn us into the laughing stock of our neighborhoods and workplaces. Perhaps there is a little bit of pride and ego in the mix. Maybe we have been taught by society that only the strong survive, and fear exhibiting weakness will place us at the bottom of the pecking order.

Unfortunately, God expects us to show our weaknesses. Whether it is sin in our lives or just fear, we need to be able to share them with God. Our children need to see us admit our sins and ask for forgiveness. Society may mock weakness, but God values our honest appraisal of our need for Him.

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Teaching the Bible to Older Wiggly Learners

Teaching the Bible to Older Wiggly Leaners - Parenting Like Hannah — Student recreating Bible stories from building blocks

Parents of preschool children and preschool teachers are prepared for children who get the wiggles. For a wide variety of reasons, there are now also many older children and teens who have trouble sitting still in class. Whether it’s from lack of self control, a physical condition or their preferred learning style, adding movement and touch to your class or your home Bible studies will help these children learn better.

Unfortunately, in many cases the movement provided as suggestions in curriculum is shallow and doesn’t add much meaning to the subject. Allowing children to run around a room for fifteen minutes popping balloons and then saying “This is how Jesus pops our sin”, isn’t really teaching these active children anything.

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Teaching the Bible to Auditory Learners

Our daughter is an auditory learner. She really does need to hear something to understand it better. She prefers having a teacher verbally tell her about a subject rather than trying to understand it by reading alone. It doesn’t mean she has poor reading comprehension, but just like a visual learner needs to see something to really understand it well, an auditory learner needs to hear it.

Fortunately for auditory learners, most Bible classes are set up just for them. Much of what is done involves listening to the teacher. If you teach a class, work on your story telling skills. For younger children, make sure you use different voices when different people speak. Even if you are reading the story exactly as written from the Bible, add the appropriate emotions to your voice. You don’t want to go overboard, but anything that adds depth and meaning to the auditory message being given is helpful.

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Teaching the Bible to Visual Learners

Teaching the Bible to Visual Leaners - Parenting Like Hannah — Hezekiah’s Tunnel Photo by Bill Lee

We are not quite sure how it happened, but in our house, two visual learners gave birth to an auditory learner. Since we homeschool, I had to change my teaching from my preferred learning style to the one best suited for my daughter. Even the way she studies most effectively is very different from what worked for me.

Shift to most Sunday morning children’s and teen classes and the mode is almost entirely auditory. An adult tells the story and perhaps asks questions or makes an application. An activity is provided which may or may not actually be what an educator would call “hands-on” learning. Once in awhile, the teacher may pull out some old flannel graph or the unit might come with a poster or coloring page.

If your child is a visual learner, they probably reacted the way I did to Sunday School. “What did the Tabernacle actually look like? I can’t tell from the way you are describing it.” “Where is Assyria? I don’t remember seeing that on a map before.” I couldn’t picture a lot of the things I was reading about, because there was nothing in my town or my culture I could compare to it. Since I couldn’t visualize many things, a lot of what I read and heard did not have as much meaning for me as it could have had.

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